# Need to Reinstall Printer Driver
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-to-reinstall-printer-driver/445461
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [April 15, 2008, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-to-reinstall-printer-driver/445461 "2008-04-15T17:26:38Z")
**Posts on this page:** 5
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Young\_Scrappy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Young_Scrappy)
#### Post date: [April 15, 2008, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-to-reinstall-printer-driver/445461/1 "2008-04-15T17:26:38Z")
Hey, my computers were networked and the one with the printer had its motherboard fried so I’m hooking up my printer, Lexmark X75, back to my laptop, Windows XP home editon. The computer is asking me to delete the existing driver and reinstall it. I have the driver on disk and it available online. First off, I don’t think I know how to delete a driver. I tried add/remove programs but its not there. Then, I did a search and deleted any folders with Lexmark in the name. When I go to reinstall the driver, it tries to update the existing one which I thought I deleted. The updated driver still doesn’t find the printer. So basically, how do I get rid of the driver please?
Thank.
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### Author:  [@drachillix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drachillix)
#### Post date: [April 15, 2008, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-to-reinstall-printer-driver/445461/2 "2008-04-15T17:33:50Z")
[QUOTE=Young Scrappy]
Hey, my computers were networked and the one with the printer had its motherboard fried so I’m hooking up my printer, Lexmark X75, back to my laptop, Windows XP home editon. The computer is asking me to delete the existing driver and reinstall it. I have the driver on disk and it available online. First off, I don’t think I know how to delete a driver. I tried add/remove programs but its not there. Then, I did a search and deleted any folders with Lexmark in the name. When I go to reinstall the driver, it tries to update the existing one which I thought I deleted. The updated driver still doesn’t find the printer. So basically, how do I get rid of the driver please?
Thank.
[/QUOTE]
This can get a little hairy, what I usually do is run a search for files with “Lex” in the name and start deleting everything that looks like its something to do with the printer. Then again, I’m sorta like a tech and stuff that looks like part of windows I am not going to delete. Unfortunately some of those files are in driver caches in the windows folder and are not obviously driver files to the non windows fluent.
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### Author:  [@Young\_Scrappy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Young_Scrappy)
#### Post date: [April 15, 2008, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-to-reinstall-printer-driver/445461/3 "2008-04-15T18:27:51Z")
I tried deleted any Lex files but the .dll files will not delete.
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### Author:  [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)
#### Post date: [April 15, 2008, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-to-reinstall-printer-driver/445461/4 "2008-04-15T18:59:31Z")
It’s probably too late, but if you go into Control Panel | Programs & Features, there may be an uninstall.
Alternatively, go into Control Panel | Printers. Press the Alt key, then click File | Run as Administrator | Server Properties and click on the Drivers tab. From there you can delete the driver.
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### Author:  [@Young\_Scrappy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Young_Scrappy)
#### Post date: [April 15, 2008, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-to-reinstall-printer-driver/445461/5 "2008-04-15T19:31:11Z")
[QUOTE=Quartz]
It’s probably too late, but if you go into Control Panel | Programs & Features, there may be an uninstall.
Alternatively, go into Control Panel | Printers. Press the Alt key, then click File | Run as Administrator | Server Properties and click on the Drivers tab. From there you can delete the driver.
[/QUOTE]
This worked like a charm but now I found out I don’t have ink. Anyway Windows can refill my ink 😉
Thanks for the replies.